My take on the many theatre productions I go and see during the course of the year.

Sandy Pritchard-Gordon

Theatre Blog

Monday, 8 May 2017

The Ferryman at The Royal Court

This is the reason I’m a
member of so many of our great London theatres.I get to be one of the first to make sure I get to see those plays that
cause a flurry of excitement as soon as they are announced.Jezz
Butterworth’s epic new work, The
Ferryman, is one such play.Sold out
in one day at the Royal Court and
with tickets for its transfer to The
Gielgud already sparse (and that’s before Press Night in the Sloane Square
venue) anticipation at being privy to seeing the possible successor to Jerusalem, has been immense.And those of us lucky enough to watched it
already can attest that we have viewed something very special indeed.

Jezz Butterworth has once more tuned into countryside rituals (Jerusalem) and gangland bureaucracy (Mojo) but on top of this he has now
tackled the huge issue that was Northern Ireland in 1981.Ten republican prisoners have died from hunger
strike in the Maze prison and it is no surprise that the IRA feature strongly
in The Ferryman.Except for a brief prologue, the play is set
in a farm in County Armagh, designed by Rob
Howell, who has left no stone unturned in creating the Carney’s realistic
overcrowded farmhouse kitchen.The house
is inhabited by several generations of the Carney family and it’s the time of
year when they and their extended family celebrate the annual harvest.However, two incidents imbue this year’s
festivities with a sinister element.The
body of Quinn Carney’s (Paddy Consadine)
brother, Seamus, has been found face down in a bog, and this in turn elicits a
visit by a leading republican.We
discover that Quinn defected from the IRA just before Seamus went missing; it’s
all too obvious that one’s past can never be totally erased.Butterworth
equally demonstrates that the power of love (especially the forbidden and, in
this case, hidden kind), can never truly stay in the shadows. From the all consuming and tender relationship
between Quinn and his brother’s wife, Caitlin (the astonishing Laura Donnelly) to the two elderly
sisters who both still mourn their loved ones, love is the heart and soul of
this magnificent play.

As with Jerusalem, The Ferryman merges the otherworldly with meticulous realism.Aunt Maggie far away (Brid Brennan), in her rare moments of lucidity, entrances the
children with her magical reminiscences, whilst the sole Englishman, Tom Kettle
(John Hodgkinson) produces a live
baby bunny and goose and there is also a live baby on stage.All of which helps ensure that we, the
audience, are as one, silent and transfixed as the story enfolds.

It takes a director of Sam Mendes stature to be able to choreograph
a cast of 21, plus baby on the relatively small Royal Court stage.The
action unfurls as naturally as this ensemble of actors inhabit their roles.And his attention to detail is
unrivalled.Genevieve O’Reilly as Quinn’s sickly wife, Mary, doesn’t need to
voice her hurt that she knows she has a rival for her husband’s affections.A quiet turn of her head so as not to watch
Caitlin taking charge of her kitchen is enough. Mendes also manages to change the atmosphere in the blink of an
eye.From the sexual frisson when we
first see Quinn and Caitlin dancing together to the tension and then fear when leading
Republican Muldoon (Stuart Graham)
issues his demands.

All the characters, thanks
to the brilliance of the cast, are fully formed and real.No caricatures here.Paddy
Consadine, in his first stage role (who would believe it) has a commanding
stillness, speaking each line as if it’s the first time it’s been uttered.Laura
Donelly is equally fine.Their love
for each other is so heartbreakingly real that the very air between them seems
to crackle. Dearbhla Molloy imbues the irascible Aunt Pat with an acerbic wit
and profound passion for the Republican cause, whilst relative newcomer, Tom Glynn-Carney, is remarkable as Shane Corcoran, whose inability to keep
quiet will get him into deep trouble with Muldoon.

As you can probably gather,
I can’t rate The Ferryman highly
enough.Jezz Butterworth who has named his play after Charon, the ferryman
of Hades who carries souls of the newly deceased across the rivers Styx and
Acheron that divided the world of the living from the world of the dead, has
done it again.And despite the running
time of 3hrs 20mins, or maybe because of it, I have booked to see it again in
the West End.If you want to see a gem,
hurry up and book too, before it’s too late.